"Fiscal cliff" deal includes change to retirement-contribution rules

The legislation to avoid the "fiscal cliff" includes a provision that would allow workers with 401(k)s, 403(b)s and other defined-contribution plans to convert to a Roth IRA at any time. Currently, plan participants can take such a step only after one of three qualifying events. "Basically, the new rule simply means you can now do intra-plan 401(k) conversions from traditional to Roth in the same manner you can do so for IRAs," Michael Kitces writes.